


when grass was green and grain was yellow

by thekindmagic



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-01-06
Packaged: 2018-09-15 08:08:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9226043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thekindmagic/pseuds/thekindmagic
Summary: Even with Lady Lunafreya dead and Noctis gone from the world, Umbra lingers. Every so often, the messenger spirit drops in on the ones left behind. It offers them the same glimpse into the past it had once offered Noctis…





	

**Author's Note:**

> For a prompt on Tumblr: an absent look or touch
> 
> (Title, once more, from a song: "Try to Remember"  
> It fits this whole idea really well... Go listen to it maybe??)

Ignis can see in Noctis’s memories of him.  

What overwhelms him at first is the light - it’s a cold, drizzly morning, but he could cry with how good it feels to see the sun again.

(He could, but he doesn’t. He didn’t the first time, after all.)

“Mm,” Gladio says, climbing out of the tent. “Something smells good.”

He’s followed by Prompto: bleary-eyed, yawning, but already smiling.

They look so young, so carefree. Ignis had thought he remembered, but Gladio’s scars, Prompto’s freckles, the way they shove each other playfully, half-awake…

He wants so badly to hug them.

But he doesn’t. Because he hadn’t.

“I had help, this morning,” Ignis says, just like he did on the original day. “Noct, if you would?”

Noctis is hovering near the camp table where breakfast is waiting, ready to serve. “Yeah,” he says, gesturing vaguely. “Uh, come and get it.”

_Noctis_.

He looks hesitant and proud of himself, twenty years old, hair a mess, perpetually sleepy.

Ignis utterly loses track of the memory. He just stares.

The other three gather around the table to eat, joking and shoving. Ignis had hung back in reality, used to eating last, but now he tries to move forward to where Noctis is ladling their breakfast soup into bowls.

The longer he looks, the closer he moves, the hazier the memory gets. He’s changing too much, pushing at the boundaries of what actually happened.

He curses himself for not taking advantage of these moments while he had the chance.

Gladio slurps his soup, Prompto laughs, Noctis turns to Ignis with a smile. Ignis tries to put a hand on his shoulder.

The memory fades out, and he’s in the dark again.


End file.
